


A Hundred Billion Stars Between Us

by Tawryn



Category: The Expanse (TV)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Beta/Omega, Crew as Family, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Multi, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, OT4, Omega Verse, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Polyamory, Zero-gravity sex, between s3 and s4, the eXXXpanse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-07
Updated: 2020-04-07
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:13:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23100766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tawryn/pseuds/Tawryn
Summary: Holden goes into heat.The crew of theRocihelp him out.
Relationships: Amos Burton/Jim Holden/Alex Kamal/Naomi Nagata, Jim Holden/Naomi Nagata
Comments: 7
Kudos: 48





	A Hundred Billion Stars Between Us

**Author's Note:**

> Pretty sure no one asked for this fic, [and here are my feelings about it.](https://media.giphy.com/media/aptJIZbitjf2g/giphy.gif)

It doesn’t dawn on Holden when he wakes in his bunk, sweaty and with a slight headache. It probably should’ve; that’s been his first indicator for as long as he can remember. But they’re only a few days into their long haul home from the gate, and after all the shit with the ring, Miller, and the things he saw on the station? Distracted would be more than an understatement.

He rolls over and checks the time. It’s just past 0600 which means Naomi is off doing checks and Alex is likely puttering around the kitchen, singing Martian country songs as he prepares coffee and breakfast. Usually that would be enough to get Holden up and moving, but today he just can’t summon the energy. He groggily unbuckles his strap to pull off his damp shirt, tosses it into the float, and then straps back in and closes his eyes.

-

“Jim?”

Holden startles awake, surprised he didn’t hear the door. Naomi is looking down at him, her eyebrows drawn together in concern.

“You feeling okay?” she asks, putting a cool hand on his clammy forehand.

He does a quick assessment. Still sweaty, but the headache has been replaced by a full-body ache and his skin is starting to itch like mad. When it finally clicks, Holden exhales a sharp breath of air that turns into a wry chuckle.

“It’s my heat cycle,” he says.

“ _Sabaka_ ,” Naomi huffs. “Well, good thing it didn’t start a few days ago. How long, you think?”

Holden considers. “I’d say I probably have a good three or four hours before it really sets in.”

“Okay, then.” She leans in, unbuckles him, and jostles him out of bed. “Come on, let’s get some fuel in you and I’ll have Alex take us offline for the next two days. If you’re still okay with the help, that is?”

A pleasant shudder runs through him as he remembers the last time Alex and Amos had joined for his heat. “Yeah, I’m okay with it.”

Naomi shoots him a knowing smile.

-

Three hours later, Holden is hydrated and vibrating with desire. He opens a comm link on the nearest panel and announces to the crew, “Ready when you are.”

He doesn’t have to wait long before the door slides open. Alex is the first to arrive.

Holden is bare from the waist up, his coverall zipped down around his middle, but he’s still wearing his boots. He uses them to quickly cross the room and pull Alex in for a rough, wet kiss, and Alex responds just as fiercely, meeting him teeth and tongue. When he grabs Holden by the waist and backs him up against a wall to deepen the kiss, the ache between Holden’s legs grows sharper and he groans into Alex’s mouth.

“Well, howdy to you too,” Alex says when he finally pulls back. His eyes are dark and the corners of his spit-slicked lips turn up in a slow smirk. “You feeling it, Jim?”

“Can’t tell?” he retorts. “I must not’ve kissed you hard enough.”

Alex laughs and tugs his own shirt over his head before crowding him again. The skin-to-skin contact feels heavenly, and he grabs Alex’s face, pulling him in for more kissing and acquiescing with a shiver when Alex takes his hands and brings them down, pinning them at Holden’s sides. Alex remembers what he likes. The door hisses open and they break apart, panting.

“Party already started?” Amos asks with a grin. He and Naomi walk in, Naomi carrying a case that makes Holden’s heart skip a beat because he knows exactly what’s in it.

“Don’t stop on our account,” Naomi says. She sets the case down and uses a floor strap to secure it. Then she perches on top and looks at Holden expectantly.

 _Well, if she wants a show..._ “Amos,” Holden says, and that’s all it takes. Amos is on him in a flash, moving Holden away from the wall and pulling his back flush against Amos’ front. Holden has only a moment to appreciate Amos’ solid frame before Alex is stepping back into his space, sandwiching Holden between them. He feels his skin bloom even hotter, his hole leaking in anticipation. When Amos noses his neck, Holden can’t stop the soft moan that escapes.

“Not that I’m complaining, but remind me again why you need our help?” Amos asks. Holden makes a tiny nose in his throat when Amos rubs his stubble against the side of his neck. “Because I kind of think you just like this role reversal more than sleeping off the suppressants.”

Holden flushes, because he’s not wrong, but manages to snark back, “You know I can’t take them, not after Eros.” He trembles a bit as Alex lightly traces his fingers over his bare chest. “The scent blockers still work, but there’s not much point in taking them around you three.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Alex says. “I sure don’t need to have an alpha nose to smell you right now. You reek.”

“Ha,” Holden deadpans. “I almost wish one of you _were_ an alpha right now, just so I wouldn’t have to hear all this shit talk. I’d already be knotted with two orgasms wrung out of me.”

“Well, we’ll have to fix that, won’t we boys?” Naomi says. Holden looks over at her and the roguish glint in her eyes, the way her skin seems to glow under the red-tinted ship lighting—it makes his whole body tighten with want.

“Come over,” he tells her.

Amos mouths over his shoulder and then bites down hard. Holden’s knees go so weak they have to hold him up.

“Not yet.” Naomi smiles. She makes a hand motion that tells him to turn away from her and get back to work.

Alex and Amos peel his jumpsuit and drawers down and help him step out of them. Since the drive is offline, they have to help him back into his mag-boots and it makes Holden feel ridiculous, hyperaware of his nudity. Amos had been right about the role reversal—here he is, naked and needy, on display in front of his still-clothed crew, and he’s more than a little into it. He’d be lying if he said differently, but he knows he doesn’t have to say a thing. The slick running down his thighs says it all for him.

Strong, warm hands push down on his back until he’s bent at the waist and eye-level with the bulge in Alex’s pants. Holden wants nothing more than to reach out and grab it, but then he feels Amos pulling his cheeks apart to reveal his leaking hole and he stuffs a hand into his mouth instead to muffle his cry.

“Now, now. None of that, partner,” Alex scolds. He grabs both of Holden’s hands and brings them over to his thighs. “You always make such great noises. It’d sure be a shame to keep them from us.”

Amos’ tongue licks a searing stroke across his hole and Holden gasps, nodding frantically as he twists his fingers in Alex’s pockets and holds on for dear life. He can’t think like this, never can when it gets this bad, so he gives up and just concentrates on feeling. He groans and whimpers as Amos works him over, fucking him with his tongue and lapping up his slick.

Holden rubs his face against Alex’s hard dick to ground himself, the hunger inside quickly taking the helm. He knows he’s being reduced, betrayed by his own biology, but there’s no alpha here to take him, to degrade him, to forcibly strip away everything but _omega_. This way, with Alex, and Amos, and Naomi, this is still him. He can retain a sense of self. It’s a sense of self being driven out of his mind by hormones, but it’s nonetheless a version that Holden can live with when the heat has burned away.

“Alex.” Holden flushes at the needy way the name leaves his mouth.

“Yes, darlin’?” Aw fuck, they’re going to make him beg for it. It’s embarrassing how much he likes it. Even more embarrassing that they all know it and use it to their advantage.

“I need—” he breaks off into a whimper as Amos works a finger in beside his tongue. “I need it, please.”

Alex puts a finger under his chin and tilts his head back so that Holden has to meet his eyes. “What do you need?”

Holden doesn’t know how they can all be so infuriating and also so good at winding him up. He groans and tries to focus his thoughts enough to ask.

“You’re all fucking demoted,” he hisses. Amos chuckles against his ass and the vibration radiates all the way to the ache inside him, the ache that’s only growing hotter and deeper with each passing minute. “Goddamnit, just let me suck your dick,” Holden says in a rush before the words can slip away.

Alex grins and opens his pants. “Well, since you asked so nicely.”

He moans a little when Alex gets his cock in his mouth, though not out of relief—if anything, it makes Holden even more desperate to be filled. But Alex’s dick is heavy on his tongue, comforting in a way he can’t describe, and Holden sucks it greedily, stroking along the underside and across the head to taste the hot and salty precome, feeling smug about it when Alex hisses and grabs on to his shoulders. He looks up into Alex’s face, pleased to see his eyes half-lidded with lust. Even as betas, they’re not completely immune to him, but Holden knows that has nothing to do with why they’re here.

He’s still got his fingers tucked into Alex’s pockets for purchase, and Holden digs in, trying to fuck his face on Alex’s cock, but can’t quite manage it with the way Alex is holding on to him. He feels Amos add a second finger with ease and hums happily around the cock in his mouth. Then those fingers skim over a spot inside him that has Holden's body jackknifing, convulsing like he’s been hit with an electric charge, and he pulls back to suck in a breath, Alex’s dick sliding out of his slack mouth with a lewd, wet sound.

_“Fuck!”_

“There it is,” Amos says, cheerfully. He moves his fingers a second time, rubbing against Holden’s swollen prostate, and reality shimmers, slowing like they just did a flip and burn.

When he does it a third time, Holden wails and comes all over himself.

“I always forget how responsive you are like this.” Amos’ grin is brazen, and he looks like he hasn’t forgotten at all.

The pair of them help him straighten up on wobbly legs, and then gently push him down on the bunk to catch his breath. Amos leans in for a kiss that’s filthy with his own wetness and Holden meets him readily, feeling loose and submissive in the wake of his first orgasm. When Amos pulls back, Holden has to blink a few times to clear his vision. The heat burning inside him ramps up again as he catches sight of Naomi, still watching. The desire on her face and the way her hand curls down the front of her jumpsuit makes him stutter on his next inhale. It feels like every cell in his body is magnetized toward her.

“Naomi,” he rasps. He swallows and tries again. _“Naomi_. _”_

“Yes, Jim?”

Holden’s whole body aches with need, too far gone to get the words right. The only thing he can get out is her name.

“Naomi,” he pleads.

She must take pity on him, because she slides off of the case and saunters over, slowly peeling her coverall down along the way. Alex and Amos have paused and turned away from him, and Holden doesn’t blame them one bit. Naomi smirks as she shimmies out of her jumpsuit, revealing black, lacy undergarments, and she examines the three of them for a long moment, considering, before she nods decisively.

“Alright, here’s what we’re going to do. Amos, you sit on the bunk. You can have the first round, while Alex has his mouth. I’ll take the next.”

“Sure thing, boss.”

“You got it.”

It’s devastating, the way she takes control, and Holden can’t help the shiver of want. Alex and Amos follow Naomi’s orders quickly, manhandling him into position. Amos plants his feet on the floor next to the bunk while Alex helps Holden out of his boots, flipping him over so he’s facing the ceiling. Amos tugs on Holden’s legs and he effortlessly floats down into his lap. There’s no warning—Holden just goes from empty and aching to full of Amos’ hot, thick cock in what feels like nanoseconds. He gasps, and Alex slides right down his throat.

Holden groans, wrapping his legs around Amos’ hips, pliant and helpless as they fuck him between them. Amos is big and wonderful as he drives in, a white-hot flicker thrumming through him, ramping up with each stroke. Alex is fucking his throat exactly as Holden likes, pulling back just enough to let him catch his breath here and there, and then slamming back down his throat with enough force that Holden knows it’ll be sore later. The push and pull between the two men is almost enough for him, almost, but he’s spinning out into the mindless haze of heat, his body craving something more.

The sound of the case being unlatched has Holden opening eyes he hadn’t realized were closed, and he catches a glimpse of Naomi. His vision is bouncing from the thorough fucking he’s getting, but he still gets a quick look of her stepping into and adjusting her harness. Alex comes down his throat with a low groan and Holden chokes a little, blinking back tears. When he pulls out of Holden’s mouth, the surface tension has droplets of spit and come clinging to his face, and Naomi laughs softly.

“You’re a mess,” she says, her voice warm.

Naomi trades spots with Alex and tenderly wipes his face with a damp cloth, then runs a thumb over his lips. He stares up at her, dazed.

“Okay?” she asks him.

He’s more than okay. Each glide of Amos’ dick stokes the inferno inside him, burning away all his elements until he’s hovering on the edge of the unknown. It feels like every molecule in him wants to crash and kick out, a proton-proton chain on the brink of nuclear fusion about to collide into something bigger.

But he can’t say any of that, so he just nods.

Amos lifts him up, pulling him closer, one hand gripping his shoulder and the other threading through his hair. He fucks Holden harder, making him howl and plead, clinging to Amos like a tether. He's quiet as ever when he comes inside him. The only tell is the rough contraction of Amos’ fingers in his hair, pulling against his scalp, and the soft punch of breath in his ear. Holden pants and mewls, trying to push back, trying to get more—he’s so close to satisfied, he just needs the knot, he _needs_ it, why won’t they give it to him? He must be babbling because Amos’ gentle fingers are suddenly in Holden’s mouth, but he doesn’t care, he can’t right now, not with the way Amos is rocking his hips against him. The fingers are gone just as soon as Holden has licked them and then they’re pressing alongside Amos’ not-yet-soft cock and Holden is blinking back tears— _yes_ , this is it, this what he wants, all he’s ever wanted, his body throbbing and ready to lock down around the simulated knot.

Then, just as suddenly, the fingers are gone and Amos is pulling out of him. He thinks he does cry then, wretched and heartbroken at the loss, threatening and cursing up a storm.

“Shhh, Jim,” Naomi is saying as she takes Amos’ place. “You’re okay. You know the first knot is for me.”

He does know that—Naomi, yes, perfect Naomi who smells like home, who slides deep inside of him with no resistance, his hole yielding, easy, open, and wet. Naomi will take care of him. She always does. He whines as she moves her hips in small, grinding motions, the knot at the base of the toy nudging against his entrance. The sheer strength of his desire for it is unbearable.

“Naomi, please,” he begs.

She shushes him and leans in, and they bump clumsily into the side of the bunk. Holden puts his legs around her and Naomi wraps one of her long, slender hands around a ceiling strap for leverage. The other hand she slides around his throat, her lips smirking when he shudders. She draws him closer to her, encouraging him to wrap his arms around her, and when she rolls her hips the whole universe seems to shrink and narrow around them.

Naomi shifts again and then finally starts fucking him in earnest. Holden takes it greedily, hot all over, so close to complete. With each thrust he gets nearer and nearer, flexing his fingers against Naomi’s back, whining at the promise of it—it feels impossibly big, like it’ll remake him, split him in two, and god, how he wants it.

“You ready for this knot?” Naomi whispers, her teeth skimming over his ear.

Holden trembles, nodding senselessly, murmuring _yes, yes, yes_.

“Then come for me.”

She gets a hand around his cock just as she drives the knot inside him and Holden shouts, coming apart loudly, the universe fusing inside him and then exploding into stars, rushing out in every direction.

When his vision comes back, someone’s patiently holding a bulb of water out for him to take.

“Thanks,” he croaks. Shit, his throat is already hoarse and he’s got another 36 hours of this at least. He grabs it with a shaking hand and takes a few gulps, feeling a bit more like himself after. Holden blinks and shakes his head a bit, clearing to fog to come back to the present.

Naomi is holding him, soothing him with long strokes across his back. He rests his chin on her shoulder to look at the other two. Alex is draining his own water and passing another to Amos. They’re both damp with sweat, looking relatively smug—Alex definitely more so—but Holden knows from past experience that they’ll be more than a little rough around the edges by the end of this. He raises his eyebrows when they bump fists.

“Enjoy your respite,” he tells them dryly. “I’ve got plenty left in me.”

“Counting on it, hoss.” Alex winks, sketching a salute before he disappears, likely to go check on the _Roci_.

Amos dips down, tracing a finger over Holden’s ear and giving it a tug. Holden closes his eyes as a rough thumb softly wipes away a tear clinging to his lashes—guess he _had_ cried then. Damn. He can usually hold that back until much later in the heat. 

He feels perfect now though, loose-limbed and content, growing more lax with every note of Naomi’s gentle humming in his ear. He’ll be locked down around the knot for a little while yet, and he opens his eyes to watch as Amos cleans up the worst of the mess, feeling warm and relaxed.

Amos pauses in the doorway before he goes, a small frown creasing his face.

“Can I get dibs on next?” he asks. Holden notices the way his shoulders sag just a bit before he hitches them up, adding offhandedly, “I do owe you one.” 

“Sure thing, Amos. I’ll call you in a couple hours.”

Amos nods and leaves, and Holden frowns at the fluttery feeling in his chest.

“Is he upset you made him stop?” he asks Naomi. The heat’s subsided for now, the sweat on his skin cooling rapidly . “Or was it the crying? I’m not sure.”

Naomi reaches for a blanket and tucks it around them. He sighs in content and rests his head against her neck, breathing in her scent.

“I think it was something you said, actually,” she says cautiously. “But Amos knows not to take it to heart.”

Holden pulls back. “What did I say?”

Naomi looks at him for a long moment and then shakes her head. “Nothing you meant, James Holden, and I’m not going to repeat it. Not dealing with your guilt complex the rest of this heat,” she finishes, pinching him playfully in the side so that he yelps and squirms on the knot still inside him.

“Fine,” he grumbles, not wanting to agree with her, but knowing she’s probably right.

She puts her hands in his hair and scratches his scalp, guiding his head back down to her shoulder. She kisses the side of his face a few times, soft like moonlight, and the tension melts away as quick as it came.

“You’ll make it up to him. Pretty sure he wants to fist you again.”

Holden’s dick gives an interested twitch, but it’s nowhere near enough to pull him out of his doze.

“No hardship here,” he mumbles, already half gone as Naomi’s fingers soothe away his worries.

When she whispers to him, _“sleep,”_ he already is.


End file.
